django-lazy-tags 0.2.3

A Django app for lazy loading template tags over AJAX

A Django app for loading template tags over AJAX after a page has loaded.

Installation

1. Install via pip

pip install django-lazy-tags

2. Add to installed apps

INSTALLED_APPS = (
    # ...
    'lazy_tags',
)

3. Add the lazy tags urls to your root urlconf.

urlpatterns = patterns('',
    # ...
    url(r'^lazy_tags/', include('lazy_tags.urls')),
)

Usage

First, load the lazy_tags library in your templates.

{% load lazy_tags %}

Then, call the lazy_tag template tag passing your tag name as the first parameter. The format is tag_library.tag_name where tag_library is what you would load at the top of the page (e.g. my_tags) and tag_name is the name of your template tag (e.g. my_template_tag). After the first argument to lazy_tag simply pass the rest of the args and kwargs just as you would pass them to your own tag.

This:

{% load my_tags %}

{% my_template_tag arg1 arg2 kw1='hello' kw2='world' %}

Becomes this:

{% load lazy_tags %}

{% lazy_tag 'my_tags.my_template_tag' arg1 arg2 kw1='hello' kw2='world' %}

After placing your template tags in the template you still need to specify where you would like the AJAX JavaScript to output to the page. That is what the lazy_tags_js tag is for:

{% block js-additional %}
  {% lazy_tags_js%}
{% endblock %}

This will spit out the JavaScript:

<script type="text/javascript">
    $.ajax({
        type: "GET",
        url: "{% url 'lazy_tag' tag_id %}",
        success: function(data) {
            $('#{{ tag_id }}-spinner').hide();
            $('#{{ tag_id }}').replaceWith(data);
        },
        error: function(data) {
            $('#{{ tag_id }}-spinner').hide();
            $('#{{ tag_id }}').replaceWith('{{ error_message }}');
        }
    });
</script>

Settings

LAZY_TAGS_CACHE_TIMEOUT

The timeout on each lazy tag cache. Defaults to 3600 seconds (60 minutes).

LAZY_TAGS_ERROR_MESSAGE

The error message to display if the AJAX request fails. Defaults to 'An error occurred.'

Customizing the Loading Animation

This is the default HTML on the page before the AJAX request completes:

<div id="{{ tag_id }}" class="lazy-tag-replace">
    <div class="lazy-tag-spinner-container"
         style="width: 100%; text-align: center;">
        <img id="{{ tag_id }}-spinner" class="lazy-tag-spinner"
             style="width: 15px; height: 15px;"
             src="{static_url}img/lazy_tags/spinner.gif" />
    </div>
</div>

To customize the loading animation, override the lazy-tag-replace, lazy-tag-spinner-container, or lazy-tag-spinner classes in your CSS.

Current Limitations

• jQuery is required for the the AJAX calls. You must have jQuery loaded on the page before calling lazy_tags_js.

• Does not work with tags that take context.

• Template tag arguments must be serializable (str, unicode, int, float, etc.).